The number of lines in the list, which contains the names of Russians restricted by Western structures in their rights, is already in the thousands. It lists oligarchs, generals, judges, owners and top managers of factories, artists. The registers include members of their families – both explicit and secret. Sanctions restrict the movement of these people in Europe and America, the movement of their money, prohibit the purchase of businesses and real estate, set spending limits. Most Russian holders of securities can neither sell them nor receive dividend or bond payments.
Most of those who have fallen under Western restrictions are not poor people. Therefore, not wanting to lose “acquired by overwork”, they are actively looking for ways out of an unpleasant situation, trying – whoever can – to get out of the sanctions. Moreover, the European Commission announced that it was developing a bloc-wide agreement on how to dispose of the frozen €300 billion of Russians. Little Estonia, for example, counted almost €20 million in accounts owned by Russians.
I’m not myself
Some owners of foreign property and funds are ready to break with Russia, announcing the renunciation of citizenship. Like the founder and former owner of Tinkoff Bank, Oleg Tinkov, or the family of businessman and founder of the DST Global fund, billionaire Yuri Milner, who left Russia back in 2014.
European enforcement of sanctions differs from the strict American one: now circumvention of restrictions in the EU is not considered a criminal offense. However, they promise to tighten it. For comparison, the 40-year-old son of the Krasnoyarsk governor Alexander Uss Artem, who was detained in Italy at the request of the United States and is already preparing to be extradited, may face 30 years in prison on charges of circumventing American sanctions.
The sanctions prompted or directly forced Russian billionaires to transfer operational management, and even shares in companies, to hired managers. As father and son Pumpyansky, in order to mitigate losses, they left positions on the boards of directors and management, left the beneficiaries of the Pipe Metallurgical Company, Sinara – Transport Machines and Sinara Bank.
As for the preservation of lobbying opportunities, they depend more on the dynamics of personal ties than on formal status. The former owner of Uralkhim and Uralkali, Dmitry Mazepin, transferred the shares to his longtime associates, and now he himself is formally only the chairman of the RSPP commission for the production and market of fertilizers. It was in this capacity that Mr. Mazepin met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in November to discuss the issue of resuming ammonia exports through the Ukrainian port of Odessa.
The ex-governor of Sevastopol Dmitry Ovsyannikov went against the sanctions in a direct way. When he (because of a drunken brawl at the airport) was finally fired from all his posts, he filed a lawsuit in the EU court of general jurisdiction, accompanied by a petition to suspend the sanctions. The applicant’s main argument was that, due to his resignation from public office and politics, he no longer falls under sanctions. The ex-official complained that the restrictions prevented him from doing business in Europe, in particular from registering a company in Cyprus. The court agreed and lifted the sanctions.
Thinking about children
The most creative “listers” are looking for non-trivial ways to circumvent the sanctions. Such is the old-timer of the rich list compiled by Forbes, Roman Abramovich. The billionaire, who has Russian, Israeli and Portuguese citizenship, is not included in the US sanctions list: Ukraine allegedly asked the White House not to impose sanctions against him after the businessman became an unofficial mediator in the negotiations. In March 2022, Europe nevertheless imposed sanctions on Abramovich for allegedly benefiting from close relations with the Kremlin. Abramovich denies such connections, and filed a lawsuit with a request to cancel the restrictive measures of the EU.
In early January, the authoritative British newspaper The Guardian published exclusive materials concerning Roman Abramovich. The files leaked to the Guardian contain information about ten secret offshore trusts created in the interests of Abramovich. They were quickly reorganized in early February 2022, three weeks into the start of a special operation in Ukraine. Shortly before sanctions were imposed on the Russian oligarch, the trusts holding billions of dollars of Abramovich’s assets were amended. The amendments made Abramovich’s seven children, the youngest of whom nine, beneficiaries of trusts holding at least $4 billion in assets. Although, perhaps, much more – the children of the oligarch now own luxurious real estate, a fleet of yachts, helicopters, private jets, and so on.
Register of mechanisms
And three days after the publication of The Guardian, Forbes already clarified what exactly it was about. Assets in the form of yachts and boats registered through offshore companies and trust funds (that is, actually not declared by Roman Abramovich) were discovered. If these data are to be believed, Roman Abramovich could own at least 10 more yachts and vessels, in addition to the six yachts worth at least $1 billion that are already public knowledge. Eight of the “found” vessels are small ones that are “used to service the $427 million 533-foot Eclipse megayacht that Abramovich built in 2010. This beauty is now moored in the Turkish port of Bodrum along with three other yachts. The 220-foot Garcon is anchored nearby, also in Turkish waters.
Will property and money be taken away from children? Is not a fact. Unlike the family members of some state officials, many families of oligarchs who fell under sanctions escaped restrictions. In addition, other curious information about the affairs of Roman Abramovich became known: about a month before the start of the SVO, he sold his stake in a large Russian timber industry company, among whose other shareholders was the Russian government.
Forbes still lists Roman Abramovich as a billionaire with an estimated net worth of $8.7 billion. While the mega-yachts and planes are now technically owned by his children, the oligarch appears to continue to control them, in particular by using the planes.
Stories about how successfully and in what ways resentful Russian oligarchs will go to get out of the sanctions seem to take a significant place in the content of the Russian media in the near future.